


Playing Pretend

by McNuggiesSnapped



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms
Genre: Doubt, Linked Universe (Legend of Zelda), Mental Health Issues, Nonbinary Wild (Linked Universe), Paranoia, Self-Hatred, Trust Issues, Wild (Linked Universe) Angst, Wild (Linked Universe)-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-15 10:42:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28687323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/McNuggiesSnapped/pseuds/McNuggiesSnapped
Summary: Wild will often find themself consumed by doubt. They believe their relationships with the others are fake, and that they hate them.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 57





	Playing Pretend

**Author's Note:**

> Yet another vent fic, this time written during a breakdown. I was going to keep this in my docs but a friend encouraged me to post it so here it is.   
> Standard warning for mental health issues, this time centered around Wild's relationships and the hardships that come with a distorted sense of reality and trust issues.

Wild often found themself in doubt.

They would say something small, a thing that later seemed ridiculous to have mentioned at all. The others wouldn't know how to respond, or would ignore that they had spoken.

Naturally, Wild would then begin to believe they were hated.

They were stupid. They spoke stupidly, they acted stupidly, so everyone must think they are stupid.

Out of their stupidity, the others found amusement. They would laugh at Wild's desperate attempts to seem normal. To be one of them.

When they weren't amusing, they were disgusting. They would be ignored then and left to ponder what they had done wrong, why the conversation stilled.

They would think back, and find every flaw of speech, every idiotic statement or remark, stories no one wanted to hear, days no one wanted to put up with them.

It can be assumed the others do not voice these truths because they cannot rid themselves of Wild. They cannot yell until they run away, they cannot shove them into the corners of their temporary settlement until they leave of their own accord. No, they cannot rid themselves of Wild because they will come back. They will cry, they will hate it, but they will force themself back into the mental torture that is living with people who hate you, because they cannot leave.

Fate or whatever brought them together to begin with would pull them back and even if it didn't Wild has grown too used to sitting around a campfire and listening to others talk, quite often with their voice tight, constricted in their throat by a vice like grip, unable to speak but contributing where possible.

They hate hearing kind words. The 'I love you's sounding so sweet and bringing warmth as well as a sickening dread, the encouragement they crave, the bond they need, all adding to the hollow feeling in their chest.

They know it isn't real.

They know and it hurts.

They need someone to love them and give them the things they've never had but whenever they think they've found someone willing it's all just a lie, a farce cleverly crafted and maintained for the entertainment and benefit of the friends, the family they've found.

They're kind just to keep them around, to keep them dependant. But underneath it becomes sickeningly cruel satisfaction they get out of watching them stumble and break trying to understand the world and it's people, trying to be like them when they have no idea of how to start.

And yet Wild becomes attached, they know it's fake but what can they do. When they call it out, make accusations towards their friends, they are met with a calm gentleness they experience from no other source. They need the reassurance that at the end of the day does them nothing and only gets twisted into more fuel for the fire of doubt burning across their mind, ravaging any and all sweet innocent thought of perfection and family, of love and forgiveness, of understanding and kindness.

Wild may know it's all fake. But they'll pretend, pretend it doesn't hurt when they suffer in silence because someone else experiences worse and deserves the love they crave like an addiction, pretend they don't understand the hatred in the eyes and words of their friends, pretend they feel anything but fear when the conversation fades to silence or someone acts a little too quickly to bury what they've said.

Pretending is easy. It hurts but it's easy. And if it makes others happy they'll pretend as long as they can, so what if they're hurting at the hands of the people they love?


End file.
